Technology

Mac OS Yosemite

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Its that time of year again. Apple has come out with its new OS. This time around I tried the Beta on my personal laptop. I was pretty happy with it so i installed it my remaining computers today when it became available.

One thing that is always a challenge when Apple OS upgrades come out is that some apps just don’t work. Typically it is my VPN app or Dragon Dictate or something specialized. This year I was pleased to see that everything worked without needing upgrades.

The biggest challenge for me isn’t upgrading my personal machines (I already did that). it will be upgrading MC’s and getting my parents iMac upgraded. I think MC is on Mavericks but her Macbook is getting up there in age. My parents are now 2 OS versions behind and getting time to go over there and upgrade is challenging.

More Wireless in the Subway is Good

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This week I started noticing I was getting wireless signal on my phone in the stations in Queens on the way home from work. I was surprised since I hadn’t had that happen before. For several months if i wanted to check mail or sync something i knew i had to wait till 5th ave on the way in or 5th ave was the last chance i got till i got home on my return trip.

After a few days of curiosity I searched the internet and found that the MTA did announce new stations coming online this month. It was just challenging to find what stations. Once i found the list i confirmed that all the stations on my route home in Queens will get signal. That will be helpful to me when i am checking mail on my way into work each day. I have found that my commute is a good time to sort through all the mail from overnight and get quick responses back to people.

Of course the downside of signal in stations are people making calls. Data is great but having some clown talking loudly on the subway into their phone is not fun. Especially when they leave the station and there is the inevitable “hello, hello, can you hear me” when they drop the call. I guess progress has a price.

Partial Goodbye Google

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Today I took the next step in my exodus from Google services.  I deleted my old @powerz.org mail domain from Google Apps.  I had used it for several years before retiring it for a newer one about a year ago.  With my mail backed up elsewhere and after I finally got all of the services dependent on the domain moved I was able to delete my account.  it felt good, however my other Google Apps Domain is more of a challenge.  I still use some of the google doc’s associated with it and figuring out an alternative is my current challange.

Securing my email a bit

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Today I completed my copying of my email off my Google App’s account.  That means all my data is safely on other systems besides Google Apps.  I finished re-pointing most of my domains to my new web host.  Next up is completing migrating my parents to the new system.  I cannot yet delete my Google Apps for Work account but i am one step closer.

A New Search Engine

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As a continuation of my previous discussion on my recent aversion to all things Google over the past month I have been moving my default search engine elsewhere.  I have been a fan of startpage.com.  I have heard from people I know that their search results are not nearly as good as google but they don’t log your searches so I made them my default search provider on my computers.  I do use Yahoo sometimes as an alternative to Google.  They may be close to Google in the data retention but the advise I got was they are a bit more transparent and better at fighting requests to hand over data.  That is purely opinion but the opinions of people I trust.

My Sudden Allergic Reaction to All Things Google

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I have recently had a technical dilemma.  I have been a user of many Google services over the years.  I have several Google Apps for Work domains.  I post private videos of my family on Youtube.  I have loved Google Voice long before Google owned it.  For most of the time I have used their services I have know there have been some questions about what they do with all the data collected.  From day one of Gmail you knew they were looking at your mail to give you ad’s.  At the time I brushed it off, especially since i didn’t really start using gmail for a few years after it came out.  After I did the lingering security questions were still there but because they provide services that really work well I didn’t question anything nor did I really care.  The cool aid was great.

The problem I am facing recently is I have read more specifically about what data Google collects and how long they store it.  Or rather how they don’t really say how long they store it.  There are many discussions on the topic, here, here, here, and many other places.  After reading a lot on the topic and talking with a few people I work with more knowledgeable on the subject than I am I decided the great user experience wan’t worth all I was giving them.

If was to move providers I needed first an email provider.  2nd I needed to stop using Google Voice.

Until very recently that was no small feat.  I didn’t want to rely on my mobile alone.  That is why I ported my mobile number to Google Voice in the first place.  Thankfully as good timing would have it the new IOS software offers wifi calling and handoff to computers for calls.  This is not nearly a replacement for google voice for me, but it made it easy to move back to one mobile for everything since as long as I had WIFI I know my number would work.  With my new iPhone 6 I would be able to solve my Google Voice dependency.  Next up of course is the bigger issue, my email hosting.  If just picking anyone I would have gone with Office 365 or some other cloud offering.  The problem was as I kept talking to people and reading more I have to say I wasn’t too happy with the US governments tactic’s on getting access to people’s accounts.  After that statement I know people are going to say if you don’t have anything to hide, why would you worry.  Well I don’t have anything to hide, but that’s not the point.  I would rather not know my government could relatively easily get access to my stuff with a court order that apparently happens more often than you would like.  I don’t think I am being paranoid guy about this.  To me it feels more like ignorance is bliss.  Since I do know how creepy stuff is apparently now a days I don’t just want to leave Google mail I want to ensure my data is safe where ever i put it.

I thought about my own server.  I just don’t want to deal with it.  The super secure Swiss email hosting provider was too expensive.  I opted for a well known general web hosting provider in Switzerland were data privacy laws are much more strict than in the US.

Next up for me is to goto the T-Moble store and port my number.  After that it is lots of mail copying to my new provider.

Finally a reason to use FaceTime

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Loving the ability to send and receive FaceTime calls over the mobile network anywhere since I am in London and missing MC and the girls. MC just rung me up twice and I rang them once to check on a gift I wanted to get. That it works so easily is fantastic. This is why I love apple products they just work.

Synology DS412+

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I have been a user of a Drobo for several years now. It meet my storage needs even if it wasn’t anywhere near as fast as i wanted it to be. I used my desktop computer as a server and had at one point two Drobo’s attached to it. This year my old one started acting up so I am down to one Drobo. I had been slowly upgrading the storage on it but it has become apparent that I needed an upgrade. Jayson suggested Synology since he loved his Synology NAS. I had read good things about them in the past but I wasn’t really sure I wanted a NAS. I ended up buying a much cheaper Transporter in an attempt to solve only one of the storage issues I had. I wanted a private cloud solution. That was a mistake. The Transporter was nice but I had issues with the software. It didn’t do exactly what i was looking for. It was close but just not enough. At that point I started to research all the things i could do with a Synology and I got very interested. It does what i want with private cloud storage as well as tons more features. I was sold and made the investment in one.

Today I received my Synology DS412+.NAS along with 2 4TB drives. I will upgrade to a 3rd drive after i get the system setup. 4TB of usable space wont be enough once I get started. I have already started copying my files onto the new NAS. I also got Plex configured but need to wait till I get my media moved over. That means it will be a few days as the transfer takes a long time.

Once I get all my data on the Synology I need to setup backups of the data back to my old Drobo so I have an extra copy. Once that is done I also have plans to try a cloud backup service. Backing up to one hard drive a year and putting it in offsite storage at my dad’s is not going to work anymore with this much data to backup.

Finally Ordered a New TV

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I have had my current Sony Bravia 40″ LCD TV for 8 years.  I got it at a huge discount as part of a Best Buy store opening I got to goto working at Partsearch.  My dad got the exact same TV but his broke at least 3-4 years ago.  Mine kept on working.  It even won out against MC’s tv when we merged our stuff of course I didn’t think there was much contest since she had a 27″ CRT or something!  Over the past year or two I have noticed dim marks in a pattern in the middle of the tv.  At first MC didnt see them but then they became more apparent.  She didn’t think there was any need to replace the tv and in reality it works perfectly well.  The dark spots got me wanting something bigger and newer.

Last holiday season i decided to take all the gift money i got and put it towards a new one.  The only problem was picking the right one.  Good reviewed LCD TV’s were more than i wanted to pay even if I could afford it.  I wasn’t sold on Plazma even though everything i read says that the new generations of them are really good and much cheaper than LCD.  Burn in horror stories of years past still stick in my mind so it was back to LCD options.  Then I found what I wanted but it wasn’t released yet.  Finally I got my head in the game and the model I wanted was on the market after what felt like several months (because it was several months from announcing them at CES to them being able to be purchased).

So yesterday after work I went to the store to order my new Vizio 55″ M series.  I did in fact goto Best Buy.  I am not a fan of that store anymore but I wanted the TV professionally mounted and they had better options that I know people have had good luck with vs ordering from Amazon.  I also went with a Vizio TV.  Several people have said they are built like crap.  I am hoping the online reviews are correct since many of them say they are good value TV’s.  I don’t need earth shattering features.  This TV comes with 3d and “smart” functionality both of them I don’t even want.  I don’t care for 3d and my smart features will be gotten from my Sony Google TV that probably is better than the built in functions.  The price was much better than more popular name brands like Samsung and Sony.  Interesting during my research I found that Vizio actually sells a ton of TV’s.  I am hoping the TV lasts and is as good as CNet said it was.

I looked at both the 50″ & 55″ but I opted for the 55″.  My official reason is my eyes aren’t the best but when I was in the store with both TV’s next to each other the 55″ looks huge compared to the 50.  I am hoping not to have to buy another one for a while so i figured i would get the biggest I can fit on my wall.  The 55″ will just barely (fingers crossed) fit on the wall space we use.

The earliest they can deliver it is on the 16th.  I can’t wait to plug it into my Bose speakers and give it a test drive.

 

After years of pondering if I should get a new TV, and months of finally saying yes I will get one I finally went out and ordered a TV today.

Another Jawbone UP

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While I was away on vacation my jawbone UP broke yet again. Their warranty replacement process takes one to two weeks. They’re very good with giving you a replacement UP’s but it takes forever to get it. I am assuming since I have gone through six or seven of them and I don’t beat them up very much they are having problems with them and that is why they are quick to replace them. While I’m trying to actually lose weight and check my activity every day not having an UP for one to two weeks is very difficult. Because of that I decided to eat the $129 and get another one so I had it when I got home from vacation. I seriously contemplated getting the Fitbit Flex but I opted for another UP.  MC convinced me to get another black band one instead of the blue one I was looking at. I’m glad she did because Jawbone I didn’t have any black ones in stock so the replacement one I am getting will be blue.